Benjamin Button [Brad Pitt] is an individual who was born under special circumstances. He was born instead as a normal newborn baby, but rather with the physical appearance as an old man who had lived his life [except tiny]. His father, Thomas Button [Jason Flemyng], leaves him on the steps of an old peoples’ home right after his birth. Queenie [Taraji P. Hensen] takes pity on Benjamin and takes him in as her own child, even though she believes he will soon die. As years pass Benjamin, instead of dying, grows into a fine man and goes on to lead a life filled with all the great things that comes with a movie of this nature.

Now as usual I have to think to myself as I write any review, what is and isn’t a SPOILER? What can I say about this movie and at the same time not ruin the experience for anyone who happens to read this without having seen the movie? And I ended up answering this question by realizing that if I were reviewing Forest Gump and mentioned that he becomes an awesome ping pong player, meets Bubba and works on a shrimp boat during the movie, I doubt it would at all ruin the experience for anyone. So if you think that ruins it, turn away now and like Tim Bisley ‘skip to the end’.

This movie is about the life of Benjamin Button, who unlike everyone else in this world ages backwards. The whole enjoyment that comes from this movie is not only the obvious – from the trailer – love story between him and Daisy [Cate Blanchett], it is about Benjamin’s life experiences. Just like how we enjoyed Forest Gump [1994] for all of the stories that he would tell us about all of the things he did in his life, is the exact same thing that you’re going to experience here, except it isn’t as heart-warming as Robert Zemeckis’ tale. This story feels more real; if you can excuse me for saying so even with the completely unrealistic premise of our main character.

The story begins in the New Orleans, in 2005, with Caroline [Julia Ormund] reading from the diary of a Benjamin Button to her mother, Daisy, who is on her death bed. The diary chronicles the life of Benjamin from his birth in 1918 to when he became so ‘young’ that he was unable to live independently anymore. So the story is told with Benjamin narrating his entire life, which is a fun way of looking back at one’s self and allows for us – the viewers – to enjoy hearing him look back at his successes and mistakes with his own hindsight rather than someone else looking in on his life.

The success of this film comes from its detail. David Fincher, over the years has become more and more detailed in the stories he tells. Some of the scenes were downright gorgeous to look at, especially the one where Daisy comes back to New Orleans from New York to see Benjamin. That moonlight shining off of Daisy dancing for Benjamin was just too beautiful for words. Another great moment was when the movie began and we got the story of this blind clock-maker who made a grand clock for the world and he made it so that it would tick backwards, it was a great introduction to our story and made my jaw drop at its beauty.

One subtle aspect of this movie that I enjoyed was the how the race issue was handled. In most movies that go throughout history, we are always subject to at least one moment in the film when a black character will step out of their social boundaries and will be put back in their place by a white character. Even though throughout the movie we never really saw a black character unless they were servants or in the black side of town, at the same time we were never subject to that scene where the black man was put down by the white. We even had a minor character who was a troublemaking/adventurous black man, Ngunda Oti [Rampai Mohadi], and there is no indication of him being reprimanded or restricted other than his occupation. The race issue is also hinted at by the fact that our present time is when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans.

Just like most other Fincher films there is a throw-away interesting and humourous quirk in it. Like in Fight Club with the spliced images, and Zodiac with Toschi eating his animal crackers, here in this film the humour is found from Mr. Daws’ stories of being hit by lightening. Unfortunately we don’t get to hear/see all seven instances of the lightening striking Mr. Daws’ – I’m sure we’ll find that somewhere on the editing room floor – but I can’t wait to see the rest of them. I loved how every time we we’re told one of those stories the film quality immediately went down to something that looks like it was shot on a camera from the 1930s.

My favourite part of Benjamin’s life has to be when he became a part of Captain Mike’s [Jared Harris] crew, mainly because I liked him as a character best out of all of the other people who became a part of Benjamin’s life. He was the bigger than life storytelling seaman who helped Benjamin become a man mentally and prepared him for what was to come in this world. Also, nothing beats the scene when Benjamin takes Daisy on the boat and asks Mike to take them out to sea.

Overall this movie is a good movie. However I refuse to think it warrants being called the best of the year, and definitely not award worthy for me – excepting a few technical awards. It is a must watch for anyone who loves character driven films. However, I still think that Zodiac, is Fincher’s best film yet and I don’t see him surpassing that masterpiece anytime soon. Please check this one out though; it is a great life story from beginning to end.

IMDB says 8.5/10

Rotten Tomatoes says 73%

I say 8.5/10